New Water Science Consent-holder Charges invoices due

Environment Canterbury will be invoicing consent holders for their Water Science Charges in the first quarter of this year.

The new Water Science Consent-holder Charge – which has been introduced this financial year – applies to individuals, companies and organisations with consents to take water or discharge to water or land. The invoices cover the period from July 2010 to June 2011.

Environment Canterbury Commissioner David Caygill says the Water Science Charge is a new way of funding part of Environment Canterbury's water science investigations and monitoring work.

Previously 100 percent of the work was funded from general rates. Funding of Environment Canterbury’s work is now from a combination of general rates and user charges.

“Scientific investigations and monitoring work is required to better understand the nature of Canterbury’s freshwater resource to ensure it is managed efficiently.

“Environment Canterbury consulted extensively over the past couple of years to come up with a new way of charging for the work that provides a better balance between charging those who benefit from council services and those who drive demand for council services.

"The consultation period has come to an end and Environment Canterbury will now recover 30 percent of the cost of the scientific work from consent holders,” he says.

Water consent holders’ share of the water science programmes is $2.4 million (30%) with the balance of $5.3 million coming from general rates. Environment Canterbury’s total scientific investigations and monitoring budget is $7.7 million for this financial year.

Monitoring work includes the measurement of river flows and groundwater levels, the monitoring of groundwater and surface-water quality, as well as monitoring the ecosystem health of lowland streams, inland lakes and coastal lakes and lagoons.

The money collected from consent-holders will be used for scientific work in the zone it was collected from as well as a share of relevant regional work.

More information is online at http://ecan.govt.nz/publications/General/waterways-newsletter-summer-2010-2011.pdf